November 2018

My City Rises

My city rises like water and breaks
bounds like a river in spate,
from within, in me, around me,
and fills everything up. It’s stronger
than any known power in range:
television sounds, the whistling pressure cooker,
the shouts of vegetable vendors, and other
Sunday concerns hovering overhead and around.

The metaphor of water rising slowly up,
touching the skin every inch up
and the skin registering it all
closely, completely, clearly – translated to the abstract,
of a slow and sure rise of memories, thoughts and emotions.
It may have happened with many other losses,
but happened with only one loss of mine:
that of my home, my city, my place.